Montclair High School is a comprehensive four-year public high school located in Montclair, in Essex County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, serving students in ninth through twelfth grades as the lone secondary school of the Montclair Public School District. The school has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Elementary and Secondary Schools since 1928.
As of the 2024–25 school year, the school had an enrollment of 1,925 students and 149.6 classroom teachers (on an FTE basis), for a student–teacher ratio of 12.9:1. There were 275 students (14.3% of enrollment) eligible for free lunch and 69 (3.6% of students) eligible for reduced-cost lunch.
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History
Founded in 1886, Montclair High School quickly outgrew its original location (torn down in the 1930s) on Orange Road, the site of which is now the field of Hillside School. Initially, the school included just the Main Building but as time went on and the enrollment grew, the board of education allowed the high school to annex George Inness Freshman High School building across the street which is used for ninth-grade classes.
Facilities
The school holds classes in two buildings. The Main Building of the high school is located 100 Chestnut Street, and the George Innes Annex or Freshman building is located on 141 Park Street. Montclair High School has an amphitheater. Its Woodman Field and Furlong Field House are on Essex Avenue, two blocks east of the main campus.
Rankings
The school was the 120th-ranked public high school in New Jersey out of 339 schools statewide in New Jersey Monthly magazine's September 2014 cover story on the state's "Top Public High Schools", using a new ranking methodology. The school had been ranked 99th in the state of 328 schools in 2012, after being ranked 94th in 2010 out of 322 schools. The magazine ranked the school 85th in 2008 out of 316 schools. The school was ranked 90th in the magazine's September 2006 issue, which included 316 schools.
Schooldigger.com ranked the school 201st out of 376 public high schools statewide in its 2010 rankings (a decrease of 56 positions from the 2009 rank), which were based on the combined percentage of students classified as proficient or above proficient on the language arts literacy and mathematics components of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA).
In Newsweek's May 22, 2007, issue, ranking the country's top high schools, Montclair High School was listed in 896th place, the 24th-highest ranked school in New Jersey. The school was listed in 214th place, the eighth-highest-ranked school in New Jersey, in Newsweek's May 8, 2006, issue, listing the Top 1,200 High Schools in the United States.
Academics
Montclair High School's performing arts program includes dance, fine arts, instrumental music, performing arts, theater arts, visual arts, and vocal music.
In 2009 and 2013, seniors of the Civics and Government Institute at Montclair High placed second in the state at the We the People: The Citizen and the Constitution competition held in Trenton, New Jersey. The 2013 team qualified for the We the People national finals in Washington D.C., but were unable to attend due to budgetary concerns.
Faculty
The school's principal is Jeffrey A. Freeman. His core administration team includes four assistant principals.
"Humanities" and "Philosophy and Composition" teacher Gregory Woodruff was named "Humanities Teacher of the Year" by the New Jersey Council for the Humanities in 2010, for teaching highly rigorous classes in classical and contemporary literature and philosophy. He was awarded the Weston Award in 2011.
Clubs and activities
As of the 2021–22 school year, Montclair High School had 107 clubs. In 2009, 2011, and 2012, the members of the Model Congress/Model United Nations Club won "Best Delegation" at the University of Pennsylvania Model Congress Conference. Montclair High School's Fed Challenge Team has ranked first in the New York Region eight times and won the National Fed Challenge Championship in 2001. The Montclair High School competes in the FIRST Robotics Competition.
In 2007, 2009, and 2016, Montclair High School won the Euro Challenge championship. In 2001, Montclair High School came in 2nd place in the National High School Mock Trial Championships held in Omaha, Nebraska. It was the New Jersey High School Mock Trial champion in 2006, and was named co-champion with Bordentown Regional High School in 2020 after the finals were canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Athletics
The Montclair High School Mounties compete in the Super Essex Conference, which includes public and private high schools in Essex County and was established following a reorganization of sports leagues in Northern New Jersey by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA). Until the NJSIAA's 2009 realignment, the school participated in Division B of the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League, which was comprised of high schools located in Bergen County, Essex County, and Passaic County, and was separated into three divisions based on NJSIAA size classification. With 1,596 students in grades 10–12, the school was classified by the NJSIAA for the 2019–20 school year as Group IV for most athletic competition purposes, which included schools with an enrollment of 1,060 to 5,049 students in that grade range. The football team competes in the Liberty White division of the North Jersey Super Football Conference, which includes 112 schools in 20 divisions, making it the nation's biggest football-only high school sports league. The school was classified by the NJSIAA as Group V North for football for 2024–2026, which included schools with 1,317 to 5,409 students. Montclair's sports programs include rowing, baseball, football, lacrosse, soccer, ice hockey, basketball, volleyball, softball, track and field, fencing, golf, cross country, field hockey, gymnastics, swimming, wrestling, tennis, and bowling.
MHS expanded and refurnished its field house at Woodman Field in Essex Park. The field house houses restrooms, locker rooms, and meeting areas for many of the Montclair sports teams, in particular football. Completed for the 2008–09 school year at an estimated cost of $5 million, the field house accommodates a new weight lifting gym with glass walls overlooking Woodman Field, a film screening room for the Montclair Mounties football team, and observation rooms looking over Woodman Field. After receiving a pledge from the Furlong family of $3 million towards the project, the Furlong Field House at Montclair High School was constructed, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony in October 2008.
The baseball team won the North II Group IV state sectional championship titles in 1959, 1961, 1963, and 1964. The team won the Greater Newark Tournament in 1942, 1948, 1954, 1963, 2012, and 2019; the program's six titles were the third-most in tournament history as of 2019. The team won the Greater Newark Tournament in 2019, beating Seton Hall Preparatory School by a score of 12-1 under the mercy rule.
The boys' fencing team was the épée team winner in 2013, 2014, and 2016.
Student protests
Students protested New Jersey Governor Chris Christie's appearance on school grounds on March 30, 2010, in response to ensuing budget cuts that affected the school.
Over 200 students walked out of their classes in protest of the budget cuts in April of the same year.
Popular culture
Montclair High School has been featured in or used as a filming location for films and television shows, including:
Film
Swimfan (2002)
Imaginary Heroes (2004)
Mean Girls (2004)
Seven Minutes in Heaven (1986)
Lymelife (2009)
Television
Ed – NBC series (2000 to 2004)
The Sopranos – HBO series